


Baby, I burn Black

by IndigoJones



Category: Death Note, Death Note: Another Note
Genre: Drug Use, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Past Relationship(s), Suicide Attempt, Unhealthy Relationships, burns/scarring, post LABB, these people should not have sex, they should have therapy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-01
Updated: 2016-11-01
Packaged: 2018-08-28 12:30:17
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,264
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8445880
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/IndigoJones/pseuds/IndigoJones
Summary: Written for the Secret Shinigami 2016 exchange, for the prompt: L x B, toxic relationships.When L discovers a serial killer is targeting criminals, he takes Beyond into protective custody. This is their first meeting after the Los Angeles murders, and it seems neither can leave the past behind.





	

“How was the ICPO?”

L did not turn from his screen. Too many murders. All criminals. All died of heart attacks. Mostly criminals publicised heavily in the Japanese press.

He pushed his thumb deeper into his lip, so the nail scratched the soft skin briefly.

“Mostly responsive,” said Watari, “Some distrust, possibly jealously. The NPA have said they will cooperate.”

L nodded, still facing the screen.

“Very well. Have you made the arrangements for the broadcast?”

“Yes. You have a chartered flight to Japan on the 11th.”

L shut his eyes, felt his heartbeat through the hand resting against his throat

“What about our killer Watari?”

“You wish me to make arrangements for him too?”

“It was a murder case that received a lot of attention in the Japanese media, the unpleasant details, the wara ningyo dolls, there was even speculation the killer was Japanese.”

“We have the capacity, if you request it, to alter details about the perpetrator, to publish a false name of the killer, to release distorted images…”

L nodded. It was plausible. There was a reasonable chance that B was still alive because the current killer found his given name so odd they doubted it was genuine.

“Could we secure his location?”

“That can also be arranged. There are notes in B’s medical history - the hallucinations, for example. that could lead to a declaration of insanity. And as B’s legal next of kin, I believe I could make a convincing case for transfer to a secure facility of my choice.”

L nibbled at the bitten stump of his thumbnail.

“It would be useful, don’t you think, to have a possible victim under observation; we may even directly observe the method of killing…”

The coppery taste in his mouth alerted L he had bitten too deep. He licked the blood smear from his lower lip before turning to Watari.

“I would like those arrangements made.”

~*~

“Two fucking years and you never even said hello.”

B was sat on the bed in his secure suite of rooms, still in his loose prison clothes. L had instructed Watari to put a small amount of money aside for B to order necessities, unsure what clothing B prefered now his skin was marbled with burns.

He looked like B and he didn’t. He looked like an image of B where the features had been swirled and distorted, his right eye peering from a gnarl of pale scar tissue, his ear mangled, a streak of white on his scalp where the hair would not grow.

“I think you said enough B.”

“So why the interest now?”

“There’s a case.”

B laughed. Not B’s laugh, some horrible yelping thing that sounded more like sobbing. It occurred to L that B was genuinely insane, that the same swirling jumble existed within B. He smelt wrong, L’s nose registered the man as a stranger, the burns probably altered his skin’s capacity to secrete fluid. Pinpricks shivered against L’s skin, little acidic jabs at the disconect of his mind knowing B and his body telling him – unknown.

“It’s always a case, isn’t it? You still clean by the way?”

B was arranged tidily on the bed. Two years of prison seemed to have knocked the sprawl out of him. He sat in the composed posture of the compliant.

“You can check my arms.”

“I’ll take that as a no. I can see you, you know. Not just your dates, I can see you when your eyes are wide and your body – there’s always this tiny shake to it. I’ve been around you too long to lie to me, Lawliet.”

His body lies, thought L.

“I didn’t murder people B.”

It occurred to L the bare room contained no sugar. This observation displeased L.

“Their dates were up.”

“They didn’t have to die like that. Not a child.”

The attic rooms still got the morning sunlight. B’s hair, it still had that liquorice lustre when the sun caught it, even hacked prison-regulation short. L tucked that thought away.

“Would it help if I assured you I was very efficient. All mutilation occurred after time of death.”

“I’ve read the autopsies B. You can’t lie to me, either.”

B smiled with the remnants of his mouth.

“So what do you want from me?”

“There’s a killer, targeting murderers. Publicised murders. I thought it wise to obscure some details of the case.”

“You want control.” He sobbed the alien laugh again. “You want control even over who murders me.”

There was B’s face, suddenly underneath the scars. B looking up at him – eleven years old and pissed as hell. _Why you always got to win, Lawliet?_

Maybe it should have been Watari having this conversation.

“Once again, I don’t get any say in the matter.”

This conversation was going to be exhausting. L looked at the neatly folded blue bedspread, the expanse of bed currently occupied by a neatly folded Beyond Birthday. He’d like to sit down and calm the constant itching at his nerve endings, the price of faster.

“If you are going to kill yourself I’d rather you did it after this case was closed. You see, a convicted murderer taking his own life would complicate the data, especially if the method leads the cause of death to be a heart attack.”

“Yeah, there’s the other tell. You’re a cold hearted bastard when you are speeding.”

L gave in and occupied the far north corner of the bed, couching down and finding one biteable piece of hangnail on his right index finger. B made no acknowledgement of his movement.

“It’s Adderall,” L said to B’s profile. Crouching kitty corner to B, he could further study the ruins of B’s face. It looked like he had had his nose broken. L probably didn’t want to look further into that.

“Same difference.”

“It is a legally prescribed concentration aid.”

I keep my sanity how I can, thought L, should I have just let it go? Look at what happened when one of us let that thread go. Murder in locked rooms and a face I only half recognise.

“So are your pills legit? Has the mighty L now got a doctor in his pocket to feed his habit?”

“That’s none of your business.”

There was a time when it was your business, L conceded, but that time had passed. L was a detective. B was a murderer. That’s a line in the sand between you and my life ever being your business.

Let me hold the line how I can.

“So you tell me L, would a scrawny-ass insomniac lead detective with a speed problem keeling over from a heart attack not shit all over your precious data? I had to lose twenty pounds to pull off Ryuzaki you fuck.”

The anger in B’s voice was real, but the lack of movement was not. B would have been stomping by now, his hands flailing.

He wanted to crouch down in front of B, look into his eyes, see what was left to him of the B he knew before Naomi Misora grabbed that fire extinguisher.

“My health is in excellent condition. As L I have regular medical check-ups.”

B’s mouth was more functional on the left side. L watched it curl, watched B’s eyelids open wider, waiting for the blow.

“Barcelona.”

“I made a full recovery.”

Suddenly, B hung his head, as if the conversation was as exhausting to him as it was to Lawliet. When he spoke he was addressing the light-wood floorboards.

“Don’t shit me L, I was there. I heard what the Doctor said. Endocarditis, from that crap getting in your heart.”

“She said I would make a full recovery, with rest and proper self-care.”

B flung his head back and howled. Dirty empty laughter without a trace of B in it. It went on and L found himself focusing on his breathing not to hear it.

“I was there. How are Mello and Near?”

“Fine. I had to inform Mello his hero was nothing but a cold-blooded murderer.” L shifted his toes against the bedspread. Itchy nerves, gnawing at the bottom of his stomach. “I don’t think it helped his development.”

“He’s still got his wild side.”

Do you want him to die a murderer too? L thought. Would that make you happy B if we all went out in an explosion of blood and death?

“Besides, Near was your case B. My contributions were casual observations and regular oral sex.”

“And a shoot-out.”

“One shoot-out. In which I probably put less strain on my heart than during my – other activities. Activities you were a willing participant in.”

B stared blankly out the window. He would be seeing the forest, thought L. He would be seeing the green fields from the days when his laugh was real.

“Would you fuck me now?”

“No.”

“I thought it was worth a shot.”

L felt aware that there was pressure pushing against the walls inside him. Even with dopamine levels artificially boosted he could feel it, and it was not helpful. He regarded the anger building inside him as if it were a distant object, a new star swirling into life in the void.

Anger at who did this to B, whoever drained the life out of his beautiful crazy friend.

Anger at B for giving in so easily.

Just anger. A justified response to this situation. Observe it and let it go.

“You are certified insane B. Legally you could not give your consent to sexual contact.”

“In that case, we’ve been raping each other for the last eleven years.”

“Maybe so,” said L observing his fingers, observing them closely; the cool blue veins, the tendons, the slight wrinkle at the knuckle. “But that is no reason to pick the habit up again now.”

L listened to his pulse for a few moments. It felt like this should be the endpoint, the time when he gave B the rundown of the provisions made for him and excuse himself. He felt silence press against his skin.

He felt silence like the day he read about his mother’s suicide. In the darkness of space, another nebula coalesced. Grief.

Just a word. Observe it. Let it go.

Silence.

“They don’t die on their death date.”

“What?”

“The prisoners,” said B. “They don’t die on their death date. There was a paedo on my block, little weasel of a man with stupid good manners, had a heart attack twenty four years before he should have.”

L felt the rush, felt it washing up his legs like dopamine, nerve cells firing across synapses. Suddenly, it was too late to say not here, not now, the fuse has been lit and he – L cannot live without the rush of closing in on a case.

“So we have a killer who can change the rules of death.”

“No, you dumb fuck. You are going after someone who controls death and your numbers mean nothing.”

Interesting, thought L. Almost like finding B all over again. Finding another one out there not playing by standard rules.

“I’ve come back from a lot of cases, B.”

“Yeah, yeah I’ve seen that. I’ve seen exactly what comes back.”

“I have come back alive from three thousand six hundred and forty four cases.”

B snorted, unfolded himself carefully to lie down on the bed. The B L knew would have stretched himself out, would have looked at L rather than address his remarks to the square blue lampshade.

“You know, in Vegas there’s this thing called the gamblers delusion, where they keep playing even after losing over and over again, because they believe after enough defeats their odds of winning increase. But they don’t. Win or lose, the odds are always the same.”

“I am aware of the gamblers delusion B. It’s not applicable in this case because solving cases is not random.”

“But your odds of death are. They remain constant. And now I don’t know if even your numbers protect you.”

“You need me alive.”

B’s eyes did a slow sweep of the room, curling his lip slightly as he located the hidden cameras.

“And you don’t?”

There was no sugar in the room and his pulse rate was unstable. The situation was intolerable but yet L remained, letting the silence cool the static beneath the skin.

“I’m not sure if you are still alive B, not the B I knew. I think he may have died a long time ago.”

B let his head lol back against the pillows smiling like death. At least there was no more laughter. L was grateful for that at least.

“You think I’m not looking for L in the hectic mesh of sugar and amphetamine crystals?”

“I’m not hectic.”

“You’re as hectic as a sack of bees.”

L wasn’t sure if B thought be had made a joke, lying back, rolling his head away, smirking. He let his eyes follow the comforting grain of the hard wood wardrobe, let them linger for slightly too long so he was caught off guard, B’s weight suddenly depressing the mattress next to him, his hand a manacle around L's wrist, rough scar tissue on smooth marble.

“Just think, if this killer finally gets you, you’ll die knowing you passed up your last chance of a bang with good old Beyond Birthday.”

B was being ridiculous, playing a childish game. Nothing about this conversation was remotely sexy, but here he was, throwing his body into the ring to score points. Just like he had on August 22nd 2002 when the gasoline caught.

“You think I’m going to die,” he said finally.

“Fourteen percent chance.”

“I’m not going to die.”

B assembled his face into something like Beyond’s previous look of smugness finally looking directly into L’s face. Hazel eyes that see death dates, L thought, just like they always were.

“There’s one Shinigami in this room, and it’s not you.”

“It’s not you either,” said L.

There goes that bloody awful laugh again.

“How much more blood do I have to spill for you to see what I am?”

L breathed in deeply. On the one hand, he wanted B off his wrist. On the other, the heat of B – he still runs hot -, the pressure feels like the only thing holding him inside his skin.

“You think I lie to myself.”

“Yeah.”

“Alright then, I lie to myself.” L paused, craved the spike of sugar that was not there, continued, “but I don’t lie about you. You think you killed those people to beat me, but you’ve always known I always win.” He smiled, finally unspooling the LABB mystery, “You killed to show me what you believed you were, because the alternative terrified you.”

“And what was this alternative?”

“I thought that was obvious. The man who loved me.”

B was dangerously close to L. So close L felt the air move against his throat as B snorted.

“Your ego remains as impressive as ever.”

“I thought I was nothing but sugar and stimulant dust. Such an entity would barely have an ego, B. But you really did love me, you saved my life – what God of death would do that? You held me after my first nightmare, you took care of me when I couldn’t take care of myself, fed me cake in Barcelona…”

“I provided cake in Barcelona. You fed yourself. You’d probably have bitten my hand off I’ve I’d tried.”

“Either way, not the actions of a monster. As the evidence for your humanity mounted, you got scared,” L smiled ruefully, “It is a lot simpler just to be a monster.”

The brush of ragged lips against his own he was expecting; after missing his chance to escape L knew contact was inevitable. He hadn’t expected the warmth within him, the warmth with which he reacted, the thaw that melted something held heavy in his chest. The inside of B’s mouth was just as he remembered it, wet and soft, the opening of a body that carried a soul so much like his own.

“We are both monsters,” said B, running his ravaged hand down L’s pale cheek as if searching for old wounds long healed. His fingers were against L’s throat, familiar ghosts, like coming home to a house gutted by fire. “Also, I should mention I am carrying a knife.”

“My death date is far in the future, you have told me yourself.” L’s hands worked his way under B’s prison vest, revisiting the familiar torso and exploring the unknown territory of scars, “and you cannot alter the dates.”

“I could try,” said B.

“But you won’t,” said L and kissed him again. “You don’t want this to stop.”

They shed their loose shirts, L moving over B, wrapping his thighs over B’s as he learned the new body with his hands and tongue. B smelt different, but he certainly smelt aroused right now, saline and musk bridging the distance between them. L’s jeans were getting uncomfortably tight, the heavy fabric pressing painfully against his swelling erection. He took B’s hand and placed it against the front of his crotch as invitation, feeling B release his struggling weight as he tonged the jewel of B’s intact nipple, perfect and brown against the swathes of numb white. He groaned hard against B’s chest as B’s hand closed in around him, jerking him with toe-curling twisting strokes until he was gasping.

He rested his damp forehead against B’s chest and struggled for breath.

“I should warn you, I don’t think there’s any lube in this room.”

“You don’t need lube to come,” said B, suddenly against his face, mouthing the spot next to his earlobe. “You’re leaking all over my fist as it is,” B found his mouth again and adjusted his grip on L’s hip to hold back L’s thrusts a little, to give him the space to work. L’s eyes rolled back into his head.

“Besides,” said B, “Got moisturiser in my bag – prison issue, smells like shit, but it’ll do the job if you’re up for afters.”

“I was rather hoping you would be the one serving afters.”

B raised his eyebrows before slamming against L’s face for a kiss that had more teeth than lips.

“You want to know what a murderer feels like in your ass. Funny taste you got L, real funny.”

L broke their faces apart and cradled B’s face in his hands, stroking his cheekbones tenderly.

“I know what a murderer feels like inside me.” He dragged B in, kissing his wounded lips without mercy, “you know that,” a deepened kiss, even as the thrill of shock reverberated through B’s skin. “My body has been a weapon too.” L mumbled into B’s neck. “I just want the monster who loves me.”

“Shut up and come already, then.”

They panted against each other some more. There was more exquisite twisting around L’s achingly sensitive cock.

“I don’t think it’s going to happen B,”

B laughed softly, closer, so much closer to the B L knew.

“’Phet problems, huh?”

“Yeah, it –um –causes issues that way.”

“Okay,” and it was, when B kissed his face L was surprised to find it was okay. “Okay. But I’m opening you up real slow if you haven’t come first.”

L shucked off his jeans and underwear while B rummaged in the bag for the moisture cream, settling back to enjoy the view as B had lost his prison pants somewhere in the journey to his luggage. It seemed B’s ass had been spared the brunt of the inferno.

B looked quizzically at L, lounging on his back as he walked back to the bed.

“So how do you want to do this?”

“Like this,” said L, parting his legs and bending his knees. His reward was a B as wide-eyed and shocked as the first time L had pulled an orgasm out of him.

“Are you sure about that?”

“Might be our last chance to try it this way.”

“I don’t want to hurt you.”

“It’s three bodies and a can of gasoline late for that B.”

“God, you really are a monster. Even to yourself. To yourself, you are the worst of all.”

B nuzzled a kiss at the tip of L’s erection before settling between L’s legs, massaging the lotion firmly into L’s inner thighs and ass, suckling occasionally at L’s cock until L felt the tightness loosen, the urge to open up, to be opened up increasing as B’s hands closed in towards his asshole. It did feel good. It did feel unbelievably good, to give in at long last, to let the ache be teased out of him, to feel the warm burn of trust, like whiskey as B’s welcome finger slid home inside of him.

Judging by the heat of the mouth that engulfed him, the groans reverberating around his cock, B was enjoying the same view he had had of B so many times, completely bared to his lover, completely unashamed. L squirmed as B curled his fingers beckoningly inside him as if calling him to go deeper, to spread his legs further and relax and groan.

“Fuck this was a good idea.”

“Like that,” said B, swiping his finger in a circle around L’s prostate, making L moan so deep and precum leak so hard L almost thought he was tipping over into orgasm. “Yeah, you like that. Funny, I always had you pegged as a top for life.”

“Let’s try everything before we die,” L gasped.

There were more agonisingly drawn out strokes. L was almost laughing with pleasure, almost hysterical with it, before B gasped “I don’t think I can hold out much longer.”

“Then give it to me B, what the fuck you waiting for?”

“You to move.”

“I’m very comfortable as I am.”

“You want to do it on your back?”

“I want you in my nightmares B.”

L reached down between his legs and started to lazily stroke himself by way of encouragement. Because it was all over now. Everything had crashed and burnt and he had his legs spread for the LABB murderer and what nightmares could live up to them now. Nightmares were their natural habitat.

He bit his lip as B started to push inside him, breathing through panic. Thinking of waterfalls and hazel eyes at midnight, blood and pain and ragged hands stroking his hips and flanks, whispering gentle encouragement like a litany, “my love my blood my Lawliet,” pushing until he was deep in where the pain was. L was lifting his hips to get B deep where the dread and the emptiness hung heavy in his belly, the cold knots of a starving stomach, being filled now, filled to the brim with B driving the pain out of him.

They stared at each other for a few moments while L’s body adjusted, not too long; no time for the mind to whirr, for thoughts to intrude. L kicked B in the calf and muttered:

"Get going.”

Get going. Get the breath fucked out of my lungs and the white noise fucked out of my brain, and oh God B, if I had known it felt this good to be taken I could never have stopped.

“You’re babbling,” said B, kissing the tip of L’s nose and stroking L’s sweat damp hair from his face.

“You’re fucking huge,” said L, biting at B’s neck desperately.

“I’m a monster,” said B, “now tell me again how big my cock is.”

L tried to convey a look of exasperation while struggling against the slow build of orgasm and B in just the right place inside him, forcing noises out his throat that were almost a scream and almost the depth of relief. L grabbed at the tufts of B’s hair yanking his neck back.

“You’re a monster, I love you, please God fuck me.”

“You’re a liar, and a monster and fuck yeah, oh yes.”

They stared at each other, wide black eyes into soft hazel, L shocked but then easy with it, like his body adapted to it, accepted it, like the way he could accept anything, really, coming from B. L smiled and got nuzzled, got painless kisses along his jaw as B repeated his words back to him and back to him until he was spiralling downward and being squeezed upwards, knocked sightless and breathless by the ferocity of the orgasm overtaking him, even as B’s hips stuttered and he was filled with warmth, he was coming and coming, gasping madness, and coming some more.

B had lifted himself off him by the time L came back to himself, still heavily dazed and dreamily aware of B catching his breath beside him.

“Been a while?” B quirked an eyebrow.

“I suppose I have been rather involved in work.” L tried to sit up but a rush of dizziness and gold across his vision dissuaded him. “That didn’t go as planned.”

“You okay?”

“I don’t think either of us is really okay. But you didn’t fuck me up any worse by sleeping with me.”

B had raised himself on his elbow, looking down on L, more than a little pleased with himself.

“I know it’s too late for us. I do know that. But I’m glad we did that, just in case I’m right.”

“If you’re right about Kira –, you should know I lie about a lot of things, but that wasn’t one of them.”

“Trust the lying liar who lies.”

“Shut up B.


End file.
